Twitter is such a powerful social media tool.  At some point, though, it can become overwhelming because of the sheer volume of information you have to look at each time you log into your account.  Here are a few tools that can help you streamline your Twitter account, build traffic, and enable account management collaboration with other team members.

1.  Hootsuite
Hootsuite has been a total game changer for me.  It has helped me manage multiple social media accounts in one location (Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook), and I don’t want to remember what my life was like before pre-scheduled tweets.

Hootsuite is a web-based application.  You can use the free version, but there is also a paid version that is especially useful if you have more than one person on your team who will be managing your social media accounts.  The following features make Hootsuite ideal:

• Scheduling function: Schedule your tweets in advance.  You can use this to post event announcements, links to key sections of your website, quotations, etc.
• Team management: Hootsuite will tell you who sent/scheduled a tweet, and it will also tell you when a team member has responded to a tweet.
• View multiple streams at once: Instead of having to click around to view mentions and direct messages, all of these streams are available in one screen.

Hootsuite also offers statistics reports and a whole host of other features – I’ve only listed my top three favorites.  Mashable has a very useful guide for getting the most out of your Hootsuite account.

2. We Follow
Want to find other Twitter users with similar interests as you? How can you tag your own Twitter account to enable folks to find you? We Follow is a free tool that allows you to use hashtags to label your Twitter account based on relevant keywords. For example, #personalfinance, #feminist, #freelancewriter, etc. After you tag your own account, you can find out who else is tweeting about the same topics.

3. Follow Friday Helper
Follow Friday (#ff) is another way to find related Twitter accounts. On Fridays, tweeps will put out a list of people they like to follow. You can see who other tweeps you respect are following, and then follow their lead. You can also generate your own list of #ff suggestions. Follow Friday Helper is a free tool to help you decide who to include in your #ff list. It will identify tweeps who have retweeted your links or mentioned you throughout the week. Why list someone on #ff if they’re not helping you toot your horn?

4. Tweepi
And speaking of reciprocity, want to slim down the list of people you follow, or reciprocate when people follow you? Don’t have time to wade through your list of tweeps? Tweepi is amazing timesaver – and it’s free. Tweepi will help you flush out dead weight, as well as tell you when you need to reciprocate a follow. I generally use Tweepi once a month to streamline my Twitter accounts, but the frequency issue is entirely up to you.

These Twitter tools may or may not change your life (those types of changes are best left to the philosophers, or a particularly moving episode of The Real Housewives). However, they will certainly change your social media game. If you’ve got additional Twitter tools that you like to use, I’d love to hear your suggestions.

The first step in adopting a social media strategy is to develop a clear goal of what you are trying to accomplish. For example, one of the organizations I help has a three-pronged goal:

• Promote the organization’s services
• Educate people about legislative issues that affect the organization’s mission
• Activate supporters to become donors and volunteers

This straightforward approach is a guide that I refer back to with every blog post that I write, every tweet that I send, and every item I post on Facebook. Having a clearly defined goal helps ensure that social media doesn’t become a time suck, and sticking to your goal also ensures that your messaging is consistent with your organization’s mission. Whether you are a nonprofit, a business, or an independent trying to establish your professional reputation, having a clearly defined social media strategy is a must, especially if you plan on outsourcing the task to someone else (more on that later).

The second thing you need to ask yourself is “who is my target audience?”  You can answer that question several ways (i.e. potential customers, voters, legislators, media), and you may have several answers to the same question.  However, your answer will help give you a clue about the best social media outlet you should be using.  I won’t get into the nuts and bolts of social media demographics, but in a nutshell, aim for blogs, Facebook, and Twitter as your primary social media outlets, since they have the broadest reach. 

Connect All the Dots
Make sure that all three of your social media outlets refer back and forth to one another, like the links in a chain. Your audience may have discovered you through a search engine, and thus landed on your blog. Make sure they know how to find you on Facebook and Twitter. If someone has found you on Twitter, be sure that you’re regularly tweeting links back to your website. And if someone has discovered you on Facebook, make sure that you have a link to your website on your profile, in addition to posting content from your blog on Facebook.

For example, take a look at the social media icons in the sidebar of my website.  You can also check out the way I’ve helped connect the dots for Planned Parenthood Advocates of Arizona, and Feminists for Choice.

Should You Outsource?
You’re probably on board with the idea of utilizing social media at this point, but you might be thinking to yourself, “who the heck is going to do this for me? I’m already overworked as it is.” You’re not alone. Many organizations have struggled with finding the correct staff person to handle social media work, and for many businesses, outsourcing social media to a freelance consult has been the answer.

The key to utilizing a freelance social media consult is to clearly define the scope of the work you want them to do for you. Will they be blogging? Will they be responsible only for the Twitter component? Will they post discussion questions on your Facebook page? All of these are viable options, but you need to clearly define the role in advance.

If you would like to talk about how I can help you write and implement a social media strategy, email me. I would love to talk to you about your goals and my rates.

Before the discussion even got started, one audience member stated her concern about internet privacy and said that she would never get on Facebook because she’s concerned about identity theft. I politely redirected the focus and kept my rants about the intrusion on civil liberties to myself. But here’s some info to chew on: you have no privacy. Every phone call you make, every e-mail you send, and every book you check out from the library is being monitored by the government thanks to the USA PATRIOT Act. Google it – and bear in mind that Google will store a record of your search.  Next time you see a photo radar camera, think about your lack of privacy. Whether you get involved with social media or not, you don’t have any expectation of privacy. So unless you want to wear a tinfoil hat and live in your basement for the rest of your days, you may as well get over your fear of government intrusion. Because let’s face it . . . even after your corpse is buried under six feet of dirt, the government probably has ways to intrude upon your rest in peace, too.

Now . . . back to the discussion of why you need to get on board with social media, and what you can do to start cracking that nut.

Social media can be summarized as internet and mobile-based tools that allow people to interact with and share information. There are many forms of social media available, but for the purposes of this article, I am going to limit my discussion to the following three tools: blogs, Facebook, and Twitter. If your business or organization is new to social media, it’s best to tackle these three avenues first, because of the popularity of these tools, as well as the many resources that are available to help you maximize the investment that you put into social media.

The power of social media’s reach is overwhelming. Facebook is the most visited website on the internet, and 88% of American adults use Facebook on a regular basis. Twitter’s popularity is gaining traction as well, and 87% of American adults know about Twitter. With the growth of the smart phone market, social media’s reach is becoming even more powerful. In 2010, 38% of cell phone users owned a smart phone. By the end of 2011, 50% of cell phone users will own a smart phone. If this trend continues, I would venture to guess that 80-90% of cell phone users will be using a smart phone by the end of 2012.

Just think about that for a minute. All of these users have constant access to the internet. This means that they use social media twice as much as people without a smart phone. If you’re not reaching out to people on social media, you are missing a valuable opportunity to communicate your message.

As far as activism is concerned, let me give you two examples of how social media has been used to galvanize a quick activist response. When the Stupak Amendment was introduced to the health care reform bill in 2009, online activists utilized social media to collect 80,000 signatures in opposition to Stupak in matter of only three days. In February, Walks for Choice were coordinated around the globe simply by using social media. These events took three weeks to successfully coordinate, where the March for Women’s Lives that was held in 2004 took nearly a full calendar year to coordinate. Regardless of how you define your activism, those are impressive results.

By utilizing social media, you can guide the message.  Share links to media articles that shape the debate surrounding your issues.  Guide readers to your website, and help develop your expertise in the field.  Respond to elected officials who you feel have made poor decisions, or give a thumbs up to the folks you feel are doing a good job representing you.  You don’t have to live in Egypt to realize that social media has the ability to revolutionize the way we interact with each other.

If your business or nonprofit is thinking about getting on board with social media, what are your motivations to do so?  And what are some of the factors holding you back?  I’d love to hear from you in the comments section.

Consistency is the biggest challenge that I face as a freelancer: consistency in billing, consistency in workload, and consistency in getting paid.

Here are some articles that I wrote for Queercents about my life as a freelancer. I hope you find them helpful. And if you’ve got your own tips for making it on your own, I’d love to hear from you in the comments section.

How to Write a Query Letter
Screening Prospective Clients
Get it All in Writing
Setting Up an Invoice System
Will You Work for Free?
Effective Time Management

My So-Called Freelance Life
Michelle Goodman gives freelancers a very practical guide to making it after they flee the cubicle. Goodman breaks the freelance life down into specific advice, such as invoicing clients, dealing with deadbeats, and tracking your business expenses. Goodman also provides basic financial documents, such as sample letters of agreement, query letters, and invoices. This is one financial reference book that you’ll want to hold onto, because you will find yourself referring to it on a frequent basis. For more info, check out Goodman’s website.

A Million Bucks by 30
Do you dream of becoming a millionaire? Think it’s out of your reach? According to reality TV star Alan Corey, it’s never too late to start basic budgeting tips that can help you make that million bucks. Corey documents the very strict budgeting tools that he used to go from living in a crappy Manhattan apartment to owning his own rental properties. Some of his budgeting tips might be a little extreme for you, but Corey at least provides a very clear outline about how you can get your finances in order yourself. For more info, visit Corey’s website.

What books or blogs have helped you gain financial literacy?